You see, he thought that Christianity was what he heard preached by an old-fashioned liberal who gave ethical talks and who did not preach Biblical truth. At that time Fran was totally ignorant of the fact that there was any other kind of preaching.
This beginning to his Christian life was, as Edith says, and as he would say himself repeatedly, foundational to his approach to the Bible. In the unfolding biblical account of creation, fall, and redemption God answered his questions through his Word.
Long before he had ever heard of such a term, Schaeffer was beginning to develop what theologians today would call a biblical theology, and what many Christians would describe as a biblical world and life view. There he was exposed to the biblical theological approach of Geerhardus Vos and others standing in that tradition. After seminary Francis Schaeffer served in three different churches in the United States, two in Pennsylvania and then one in St.
But after these years in pastoral ministry, Francis and Edith believed that they were called to ministry in Switzerland, where they moved in These intervening years had seen involvement in several different ministries. This eventually became international and the Bible studies they wrote for children were translated into many languages.
Participation in the ICCC led Schaeffer into speaking and writing against the influence of liberal theology in the wider church and in particular against neo-orthodoxy. Three or four years after moving to Switzerland, Francis Schaeffer went through a profound spiritual crisis. What brought on this crisis? Going back many years to his time in college, and later in seminary, Francis and Edith were bothered by the lack of love shown between Christians, especially where there was any disagreement.
The denomination of which they were a part had been formed by a split from the Northern Presbyterian Church over the influx of Liberalism and the defrocking of J. Gresham Machen when he started an Independent Mission Board to ensure that the missionaries sent overseas were Bible-believing Christians. This new church experienced a subsequent division into two denominations within a year of the first split.
Schaeffer was a student during these divisions and had joined the part that started Faith Seminary in Wilmington, Delaware. He saw men struggling for power and using unscrupulous methods to gain or to maintain control and positions of influence. He saw church courts which were so governed by secret meetings, by prior agreements, and so manipulated in underhanded ways by men who were so absolutely confident that they were right and were serving the Lord better than anyone else, that presbytery and synod gatherings seemed sometimes more like the worst of political shady dealings and movements to wrest control by any means at hand.
He began to despair of whether Christianity could indeed be true. Where was the passion for evangelism that fills the pages of the New Testament? Where was the devotional literature expressing love for the Lord? Where were the supernaturally transformed lives of a people who were being changed by the grace of God and the power of the Spirit? Schaeffer was not only dissatisfied with the circles of which they were a part.
It seems that the only honest thing to do is to rethink, reexamine the whole matter of Christianity. Is it true? I need to go back to my agnosticism and start at the beginning. He went through a period lasting several months during which he reread the Bible and thought through the most basic questions about our human situation all over again. As God knew, in the years to come, Schaeffer would be inundated with the questions of unbelievers and of struggling and doubting Christians.
For most of his Christian life, Francis Schaeffer kept a disciplined pattern of Bible reading. He read four chapters of the Bible every day of his life, three from the Old Testament, one from the New. In this way he would regularly be reading through the whole Old Testament every nine or ten months, and the New Testament every eight months or so.
I will never forget some of the sermons I heard him preach. For my own personal life, and for the life of most of us who worked with him, I would say that his humble dependence on the Lord, his deep awareness of his own inadequacies, and the compassion he demonstrated as he listened to people and answered them were the most important aspects of his ministry and of his example in being an imitator of Christ. But how did he answer questions?
If one reads the volume of his letters that has been published, one finds the same thing; that is, the letters are informed by the central themes of a biblical theology all the way through. Of course this volume of letters is just a tiny selection of the thousands that he wrote.
But, my wife, Vicki, who was his secretary for a time, would testify that they are representative, and that this constant reference to scriptural themes was his daily practice as he dictated to her all through the time she worked for him. He often dictated a dozen letters at a sitting and would expect them to go out the next day. Much to her distress, when Vicki first began to work with him, Schaeffer would always change something on her perfect transcriptions of his words, because, as he said, he wanted the recipient to know that he had reread and signed the letter himself.
Sometimes he ministered by the spoken word, sometimes by the written word. As a pastor he helped great numbers of believers grow in grace and in the knowledge of Christ. This foundation led him to relate all that he taught to the creation, fall, and redemption framework of biblical teaching. People came to him with their troubles and in their lost wanderings, in their sense of despair and in their alienation. He spoke of who we are as proud, disobedient, and ruined rebels who will not bow before a holy Lord, but instead insist on our autonomy.
This biblical framework informed all that he said in answer to the questions of those who came to him for help. This is so, not only with regard to the answers he gave people, but also it is true of the manner in which he treated those who came to him with their questions. If I long to imitate anything about him, it is this deep respect, compassion, and grace which was so evident in the way he responded to the most miserable, difficult, and even aggressive people who challenged him.
He is created to relate to God in a way that none of the other created beings are. This differentiation makes genuine love possible. Furthermore, if we are made in the image of God, we are not confused as to the possibility of communication; and we are not confused as to the possibility of revelation, for God can reveal propositional truth to me as I am made in his image. He believed that Christian growth is restoration to the image of God, that is, to true humanness.
It was his lead in this area, and his personal encouragement that stands behind the book Ranald Macaulay and I wrote together: Being Human: The Nature of Spiritual Experience.
This approach of always going back to biblical foundations enabled Schaeffer to have the freedom to think about subjects that were not normally matters of discussion or concern among evangelical Christians.
This is true with regard to human life issues. He began to address the problems of abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia long before most other evangelicals. The reason for this was his deep sense that human persons are made in the image of God and are therefore to be treasured by us.
Human life stands at a crucial place because there is an unbreakable link between the existence of the infinite personal God and the unique dignity, intrinsic dignity of people. If God does not exist and he has not made people in his own image, there is no basis for an intrinsic, unique dignity of human life.
This sense of the unique dignity of all human persons also filled Schaeffer with a deep passion for racial equality and reconciliation, both in his own personal life and in his teaching. This sense of the dignity of every human person, and his compassion for people in their lost state, arising from his profoundly biblical approach, also brought Schaeffer to desire to avoid aggressive confrontation with unbelievers.
He treated people, whoever they were, with dignity and compassion. This led him into his work of child evangelism, for to him children were just as significant as adults, just as precious, just as worthy of receiving our time and effort.
There are many ways to observe this, but perhaps one of the best is to notice the tenderness for children in some of the great warriors of the past. Schaeffer often spoke about the biblical theme, first appearing in the life of Abraham and then developed throughout Scripture, of the believer being an alien and stranger in this world.
Louis for a series of lectures at Covenant Seminary. He turned up wearing a raincoat and carrying a pack and walking stick. He gave a short homily on the manner in which the Israelites celebrated that first Passover in Egypt—eating unleavened bread, ready to leave the country where they were unwanted aliens. It was this sense of his true home being in the Kingdom to come that helped Schaeffer to be a man with such a generous heart. When his books started selling very well there was even a Time magazine article about him , he began to receive substantial royalties.
This new-found financial prosperity did not change him. He understood, in a way that very few Christians do, that we are called to be laying up treasures in heaven rather than on the earth. It is impossible to love God and money. Francis Schaeffer believed passionately that the fall was a historical event that changed everything in this world. In particular, he understood that this meant that he himself needed to be always aware that he was a sinner in thought, word, and deed, and that, therefore, it was the mercy and faithfulness of God that brought such unexpected blessing to his ministry, rather than his own gifts, abilities, power, or righteousness.
He was acutely aware that what he taught about the doctrines of creation, fall, and redemption must apply to himself first. He would say that we each have to bow to God three times.
We have to bow, first, as a creature, for though we bear the glory of the divine image, we are also totally dependent for life and breath and everything on our Creator. We have to bow, second, as a sinner, for we are in daily need of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ to take away our uncleanness. We have to bow, third, as those who are to be taught by God, who has truth to tell us in His Word.
We do not have it by ourselves. The Lord impresses particular passages of Scripture on all of us. There are many that were especially precious to Francis Schaeffer. One of his favorite passages of Scripture was the Servant Song of Isaiah, found in chapter Later in the chapter those who follow the servant are admonished to imitate his example of speaking the words of the Lord, rather than their own words; his example of trusting in God, rather than relying on themselves.
Schaeffer was passionate about these words. He knew that only God can establish what we do, only God can teach us what to say, only God can lead us where we should go, only God is sufficient for the challenges we face.
He wanted to make a distinction between people—a biblical and theological distinction, and therefore an intensely practical distinction. On the other hand are people who pray that God will build His Kingdom and be pleased to use them as He does.
This second way, Schaeffer believed with every fiber of his being, is the message of the God who has created us, the God against whom we have rebelled, the God who has come to deliver us from judgment and from dependence on ourselves. As I look back on almost 15 years of having had the privilege of working with Francis Schaeffer, my prayer is that this might be one way in which his example would influence me. Modern Mysticism in Action: Music and Literature 5. Personality or a Devilish Din 2.
Verifiable Facts and Knowing 3. The Dilemma of Man 4. God's Answer to Man's Dilemma 5. Finding the Point of Tension 2. From the Point of Tension to the Gospel 3.
Commending the Christian Faith to Our Generation 2. Demonstrating the Character of God 2. The Question of Apologetics Appendix B. Francis A. Schaeffer — was a pastor, theologian, and speaker with an international ministry who became one of the most influential figures in American evangelicalism during his lifetime.
The pressure toward unisex is largely rooted here. But this is not an isolated problem; it is a part of the world-spirit of the generation which surrounds us. But much modern homosexuality is an expression of the current denial of antithesis.
When available, in this section you will find class materials and resources to enhance your exploration! Publisher's Description:. In , Christianity Today voted this title to be one of the top 50 books that have shaped evangelicals! For over thirty years The God Who Is There has been the landmark book that changed the way the church sees the world. In Francis Schaeffer's remarkable analysis, we learn where the clashing ideas about God, science, history and art came from and where they are going.
Now this completely retypeset edition includes a new introduction by James W. Sire that places Schaeffer's seminal work in the context of the intellectual turbulence of the early twenty-first century.
More than ever, The God Who Is There demonstrates how historic Christianity can fearlessly confront the competing philosophies of the world. The God who has always been there continues to provide the anchor of truth and the power of love to meet the world's deepest problems. Visit the L'Abri Ideas Library for free audio resources.
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